Instant messaging systems have become a method of communication for people using computers and/or mobile devices, such as tablet computers or smartphones. Many different instant messaging protocols have been developed by many different vendors of such services. Some protocols facilitate communications using the transfer of character-based text messages. Various protocols permit the transfer of images. Some protocols permit the transfer of video data. Each of the protocols facilitates communications between users using the messaging service corresponding to the protocol. Some messaging services are not configured to facilitate communication to and from user's using a different messaging service and/or a different protocol than that supported by the messaging service. Because so many different messaging services and/or protocols are now in existence, some users use multiple messaging services so as to communicate to users of these various services.